Keith Robison (robison at mito.harvard.edu) wrote:
: Our department is considering upgrading the central computer which is
: used to run GCG. We will definitely go with a UNIX box. I was wondering
: if folks would be kind enough to share their experiences with how
: fast a machine you need.
: Key points which I can think of are:
: 1) Architecture & speed (Sun, HP, SGI, Alpha, etc)
Sun Sparc 10 model 41
: 2) How many total users in department
250 spread over several departments.
: 3) A reasonable guess as to the number of simultaneous users
3-5 so far with no problems. Its been up a year, and we are slowly weaning
our users from Eugene and Sam.
: 4) Is your current configuration working? (i.e. are people
: happy with response time)
yes. 2-3 or even 4 simultaneous fasta searches seems to have no impact
on response time at the console.
: 5) Any relevant comments
Pay close attention to the GCG folks recommendations as to memory and
disk space requirements, especially memory. Certain of the GCG programs
require LOTS of memory.
Relevant other info:
96MB RAM
6GB disk space allocated:
2.1 drive for data, currently at 39% full
2.1 drive for misc progs - Sunsolve, answerbook, /usr/local/bin
1.05 drive for system and user data, about 60% full
1.05 drive for GCG programs, 20% full
SunOS 4.1.3; but will be required to upgrade (?) to Solaris for rel 8.
Release 7.x requires xwindows for convenient graphics viewing (yes I know
that vt240 works - but I said convenient)
Release 8 will require Xwindows for use of the new built-in menuing system.
The X-requirements will mean that your users must have access to some kind of
X-server locally. We have: the console, a pentium PC with DOS/Windoze and
Hummingbird's Exceede X-server, and an X-station. A number of our users
are in process of purchasing the Hummingbird Exceede. We use Novell's Lan-
Workplace as the TCP/IP stack, at least in part because of cost - its
really cheap for campuses in quantity 1000 ($5 per copy), and in part
beacause its very compatible with IPX (surprise, surprise).
I'm the administrator, and it's been really easy to administer. With
few exceptions, simply put in the distribution cdrom, and run the
install scripts. No problems.
chad price cprice at netserv.unmc.edu
(aka root at netserv.unmc.edu)